Crate and Peril (Cartoon, Column and Video)

Senator Jeff Merkley, a Democrat from Oregon, visited a detention center in Texas last week and described the facility. He said, “What you have is cyclone fencing and fence posts that look like cages. They look like the way you would construct a dog kennel.”

Jeff Sessions’ Justice Department hit back, saying they don’t employ the use of cages, but use fenced barriers. Basically, they’re cages but they don’t want you to use the word “cage,” and especially not “dog cages.”

Though Merkley saw the cages, security wouldn’t let him, a United States Senator, enter the facility, and eventually the police were called to shoo him away.

A spokesperson for the Administration of Children and Families said Merkley wasn’t allowed in for security reasons and said, “No one who arrives unannounced at one of our shelters demanding access to the children in our care will be permitted, even those claiming to be U.S. Senators.”

Uh, he wasn’t just claiming to be a U.S. Senator. He is a U.S. Senator. On the video, he had to tell the security guard more than once he was a Senator, as the guy didn’t seem like he could comprehend the information.

The Justice Department doesn’t want surprise visits to these facilities, especially if cameras are brought along. They want advance notice so they can clean up the place. It’s kinda like when your landlord wants to come by, but you want a heads up so you can make sure your house doesn’t smell like you own seven cats. As it turns out, Merkley did send a request two days in advance of his visit. Senator Robert Menendez was denied visitation of a facility in California, despite sending a request nine days ahead.

The Senator was attempting to show the American people how the Trump policy of ripping children away from their parents actually looks. The Administration is giddy about arresting anyone for crossing the border illegally, and if children are brought along, they’ll be separated from their parents and crammed inside dog cages.

Trump tweeted blame at the Democrats for his administration stripping children from their parents, despite his party controlling the executive branch, the House, and the Senate. And for good measure, he said they support MS-13. I guess one lie in the tweet wasn’t enough.

The United Nations says the Trump policy violates human rights and is against international law. Nikki Haley fired back the U.N. is practicing hypocrisy by attacking the U.S. while ignoring human rights violations of other members. The condition Haley is suffering from is called whataboutism. It’s very contagious among Trump sycophants, so be careful out there.

The administration says this policy is to prevent illegal border crossings, but that’s a total lie. Many of these separations have occurred at border crossing stations with immigrants requesting asylum. That is not an illegal crossing.

While blaming Democrats for his policy of separating children from parents by saying they passed “bad legislation,” there are not any laws requiring that parents be separated from their children, and the practice was put in place by his administration. Jeff Sessions loves this kind of stuff. You know, because of the racism. He almost squeals when he talks about it. Chief of Staff John Kelly raised the idea of this policy, you know, because of the racism.

The New York Times found that over 700 children have been ripped from their parents over a period of six months. The American Civil Liberties Union says it’s accelerated, and that over 1,000 have been taken over the past five weeks.

The U.N. created a human rights treaty called Convention of the Rights of a Child, which sets out the civil, political, economic, social, health and cultural rights of children. Only one nation in the world has not ratified the treat. Do you wanna guess which nation that is?

Mitt Romney, who famously strapped the family dog to the roof his car in a crate for a road trip from Massachusetts to Ontario, says he’s more of an immigration hawk than Trump. Despite calling Trump a “conman” in 2016, he said he’ll easily be re-elected in 2020.

Trump’s record on human rights is just one of about 2,000 reasons why that can’t be allowed to happen.
Watch me draw.